Twin City Photos

Last weekend I visited colleague and buddy Bartly at the State Fair grounds, where he was exhibiting his 1979 Camero as part of the Carcraft Summer Nationals. I’ve known Bartley for many years, one of my favorite people to travel with. Trips to Australia and Germany come to mind, and we have a trip back to München coming up shortly, with a couple of other fun people. Hofbräuhaus and Schweinehaxen here we come :)

Anyway, the CSN as you can imagine was packed with hundreds of cars ranging from nearly street illegal exhaust spitting monsters to sedans with a nice paint job. Bartley’s car kinda fits in the middle. It has to as he drives it to work on nice summer days.

After a cheese and chilli dog for breakfast and a little work on the distributor, we took a cruise in Bartley’s Camero around the ‘circuit’, i.e. drive at less than walking speed (really hard on the legs as you essentially are feathering the clutch continuously) among carefree pedestrians, not a bit concerned about getting hit or even bumped by a car. And despite all those machines on the grounds with plenty of unusualness, Bartleys Camero turned quite a few heads, because of the sound of the engine exhaust. Someone commented ‘ooh that’s a big block in there’. Bartley’s reply ‘nope, a 350 bored to 380′ (I think I got that right).

If you’ve ever been around real race cars (not wannabees with noisy mufflers) you know the sound of an exhaust subject to a fast rise camshaft. Per revolution each cylinder takes it’s turn at an angry spit of exhaust, the engine reluctantly submitting to idle threatening to die at any moment. Driving down the street lined with cars on either side, the sound the exhaust reverberates between the sheet metal of the car bodies, and you can almost feel them bounce back the sound. Sweet.

This photo isn’t Bartley’s car, you probably guessed that. We’re planning to get some photos of his car, in a more suitable setting, not with hot dog stands and people in the background. Might even do the much maligned HDR.

I was thinking about HDR’ing this one, but why bother. It’s a beaut without it. Almost looks like you could eat off that filter cover.